Date: 09/01/2022

Number: 60

Could count up to a dozen at any one time just by casting my eye about the wide, wet, empty, sandy beach, in the morning when sight lines are clear. Good brisk wind from WNW. Flags unfurled and snapping. Temp 20'C. Most monarchs were hunkered down and resting on the wet sand. All that I saw appeared to be in good shape, not tattered or worn or dead. When disturbed, they would flutter a few feet further south (always in that direction) and hunker down again. Movement seemed to be concentrated along the shoreline, (north/south) as there were far fewer monarchs a block away within the village. There had been a storm the day before. Later in the afternoon, many people, flailing umbrellas, and parked vehicles made it difficult to see any monarchs except those that flew immediately in front of me. The next morning there were a quarter as many monarchs. Wind was fairly strong again, this time from the south, approx 20 k/hr. Many monarchs were being pushed backwards (northward) as they took to the air. Exactly two weeks earlier (mid August) we saw only half a dozen monarchs along the beach the whole day, so migration hadn't yet begun. Now it's begun! So exciting! We can see more monarchs in 20 minutes here now than we can in a whole summer elsewhere.

Sauble Beach, ON

Latitude: 44.6 Longitude: -81.3

Observed by: Heather
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